How to Raise Just-Born Kittens

Video Transcript

"Hi I'm Dr. Marcia Martin and we're here at Safe Harbor Animal Rescue in Jupiter, Florida to talk about animal health care. This segment we're going to talk about caring for kittens. Raising a kitten is really a lot of fun, it's also a lot of work. So the first thing you need to do when you find that little kitten is kind of determine how old he is because then you're going to know just how hard you have to work with him. The first thing roll him over and look at that belly. If you see a little tiny cord coming out of his belly button, he's less than 3 days old. Their eyes should open around 10 days. Teeth start coming through the gum line at about 2 weeks. You need to build a nest for your kittens to keep them warm. The easiest way to do that is with either a crate or a cardboard box. You need the bottom of your nest to be bigger than an average size heating pad. Put your heating pad set on low, never any higher than low into the bottom of your little nest, cover it with a blanket and then put your kittens inside. You need to make sure that there's room around that heating pad for the kittens to kind of scoot off if they get too hot they can regulate their body temperature that way be getting onto the warm area and moving off of it. Kitten milk replacer is important. Never, never feed a kitten cow's milk. Now this is where it gets hard because feeding kittens is just like feeding a newborn baby. When they're less than a week old, you're going to be up and down with feedings. You need to feed them maybe 8 times a day about 4 ounces for that first week. Now two weeks things get a little easier, you're down to 4 feedings of maybe 12 ounces. And by three weeks it's 3 feedings and about 27 ounces at a time. By four weeks, you can start them on some kitten food. Generally I don't like kibble, start them with a good canned diet, preferably a grain free canned diet. Introduce it by putting it on their paws, leaving it on the little low bowl that they can kind of roll around in and they'll figure out pretty quick that that's food and that will give you a break from the feeding process. Now when they're little, they don't urinate and defecate on their own and this is really important because a lot of people don't know that they need help to do that. So you need to simulate the mother as she stimulates them to urinate and defecate by taking a warm wash cloth with warm water and just kind of rubbing it around their little genital region and usually they'll go ahead and pass urine and stool for you. The urine should be clear, the stool should be formed. If it's not, you probably need to take your kitten to the vet which is a good idea anyways. When you find a little kitten you need to take it to the vet, let it be checked for intestinal parasites and fleas and any other infectious disease that may need to be treated with medication. Once you've got that done, then you're on your way to raising your kitten."